Over the past few years, thermoelectric generators have become the focus of a growing number of studies, due to their ability to convert waste heat into electrical energy. Quantum dots, semiconductor crystals with distinctive ...
Quantum mechanics and the general theory of relativity form the bedrock of the current understanding of physics—yet the two theories don't seem to work together. Physical phenomena rely on relationship of motion between ...
Quantum Physics
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Human beings create a lot of data in the digital age—whether it's through everyday items like social media posts, emails and Google searches, or more complex information about health, finances and scientific findings.
Quantum Physics
Sep 19, 2019
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It may still be decades before quantum computers are ready to solve problems that today's classical computers aren't fast or efficient enough to solve, but the emerging "probabilistic computer" could bridge the gap between ...
Quantum Physics
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Understanding how particles behave at the twilight zone between the macro and the quantum world gives us access to fascinating phenomena—interesting from both the fundamental and application-oriented physics perspectives. ...
General Physics
Sep 17, 2019
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For decades, physicists have been attempting to reconcile quantum mechanics, the physics of the very small, with gravity, the physics of the very large. While many academics are working on quantum gravity, they often use ...
Quantum Physics
Sep 17, 2019
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Stop! In the name of quantum science and engineering.
Quantum Physics
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Quantum computing harnesses enigmatic properties of small particles to process complex information. But quantum systems are fragile and error-prone, and useful quantum computers have yet to come to fruition.
Quantum Physics
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A team from Dartmouth College and MIT has designed and conducted the first lab test to successfully detect and characterize a class of complex, "non-Gaussian" noise processes that are routinely encountered in superconducting ...
Quantum Physics
Sep 16, 2019
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A team of researchers from the University of Glasgow and the University of Southampton has devised a novel way to test quantum mechanics in a non-inertial reference frame by using a rotating interferometer. In their paper ...
In physics, a quantum (plural: quanta) is an indivisible entity of a quantity that has the same units as the Planck constant and is related to both energy and momentum of elementary particles of matter (called fermions) and of photons and other bosons. The word comes from the Latin "quantus", for "how much." Behind this, one finds the fundamental notion that a physical property may be "quantized", referred to as "quantization". This means that the magnitude can take on only certain discrete numerical values, rather than any value, at least within a range. There is a related term of quantum number.
A photon is often referred to as a "light quantum". The energy of an electron bound to an atom (at rest) is said to be quantized, which results in the stability of atoms, and of matter in general. But these terms can be a little misleading, because what is quantized is this Planck's constant quantity whose units can be viewed as either energy multiplied by time or momentum multiplied by distance.
Usually referred to as quantum "mechanics", it is regarded by virtually every professional physicist as the most fundamental framework we have for understanding and describing nature at the infinitesimal level, for the very practical reason that it works. It is "in the nature of things", not a more or less arbitrary human preference.
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